Factors influencing online consumer behaviour. A case study of clothing company Barfal.

The present case study explores the different factors that may influence online consumer behaviour. The company the research is conducted for, Barfal, is an apparel webstore from Helsinki, Finland. The aim of the research is to better understand the factors that may influence the behaviour of Barfal’s target customers, in order to provide Barfal with optimization opportunities. The research questions are the following: What factors influence the consumer buying process in apparel e-commerce? How can the consumer buying process be optimized in apparel e-commerce? The research is qualitative, the data was collected through eight in-depth interviews with respondents that fitted Barfal’s target customers. The theoretical framework is based on previous studies in the subject area and multiple theories on the topics of consumer behaviour and the buying decision-making process. The main references were marketing books about e-commerce optimization, digital trust, and consumer behaviour. The results showed that factors such as information quality, user interface quality, shipping fees, peers’ suggestions, or early adoption of technology play an important role at different stages of the target consumers’ decision-making process. Furthermore, many of these factors were found to have valid linkages to multiple principles that form part of the psychological processes presented in previous literature. In general, the conclusion of the study is that the factors that can influence a consumer differ depending on the product segment or location of the purchase. While the results of this thesis did match certain factors presented in the theory, they did also contradict some of them